for starters

rather been a reflective few wks. bdays and some free time can cause that we guess.

of the many thoughts we had, there was one about us and bands. one previously unknown similarity has come up.

that we tend to stay with the bands we had a part in starting.

we look back to all the bands we’ve had the great opportunity to play and perform with and see that point come up way too often. its great to see how a band evolves from nothing and the road it goes on is well worth all the time spent. perhaps that is the fire that keeps us involved thru thick & thin. the great thing about the 3 bands we are in right now is that we’ve been there in all of them in the formation stages. that bodes well moving forward. the forecast is solid and is going to be busy!

the reasons why we haven’t stayed in the bands we weren’t there in the formation stages all vary. trying to come up with a catch all, all encompassing phrase for the reasons but so far it has eluded us. perhaps its a lack of feeling that we are not a contributing part of something but rather a bit player or a gun for hire or some other elusive feeling. or since we weren’t there from day1 we are not that emotionally and time invested and that makes saying au revoir easier.

speaking of feelings, it feels like this post will likely get edited once we come up with more answers and think this thought thru more fully! at least we’ve started the thought process by finally writing it down!

that’s a wrap April!

another month has flown by!

struggling with a flu bug for the later half of the month has made things more challenging but nonetheless, forward ho!

today we were sadden by the news that Molly’s Chamber, the cover act we left 7 weeks ago has now officially gone on hiatus. we thought it would be easy for them to find a replacement bassist as the material and the other players were quite solid. still unknown what exactly has transpired but its still sad news nonetheless. here’s to hoping they all land on their feet!

the dj nights at the Schomberg pub every Saturday have been a treat. the regulars and the casual atmosphere make for a great time out each and every time! its also been great to pick up on what’s new and happening in the music scene and to gauge what ppl want to hear. been havin’ a ball no matter who shows up!

also this past month, we’ve been jamming with a few guys we’ve known almost since day 1 on the bass. we have been lucky enuff to finally find a singer/guitarist that fits. so far its been a helluva lot of fun playing what we all like to play and hear in a no pressure/casual/just4kicks atmosphere. finally a group that wants to do a few Clash songs!

after Skipapalooza (pic=new sticks&bag this month!), the members of Rosalita asked us to become the permanent percussionist for the band. an offer in which we quickly/gladly accepted! its been a great way to keep our feet wet on the kit and also to learn/develop musically. the forecast calls for good times ahead & 2nite is our first official jam since the party. there’s lots of new material & a new bassist on the horizon as well!

Those Handsome Hooligans have been picking up speed for a rather hectic summer. expect more posts on that in the days ahead. expecting a tee shirt run in the near future. crazy! check out our posters while u sanitize!

lastly, we’ve been pickin’ at the ol’ geetar of late. been thinkin’ aboot an open mic nite in the near future. we’ll see. ah, so many songs, so little time… the fire that fuels us. new shoes this past month too! feels so good!

return of the bloodskin

if u can recall, we recently found blood on the rental drumkit at the rehearsal factory. so we even more recently returned (a full 2 weeks later) to the exact same room to not only find the same old blood on the snare but even more blood than before!

good thing we had anticipated this & had brought our own snare for the rosalita jam!

speaking of the rosas, we did our last pre skipapalooza prep show at an open mic at grossmans tavern this week. each member got to choose a song for our mini set which was way cool. also the stage setup at grossmans is now improved and makes a massive difference.

whoa! lights even! a riser too! better soundboard! the grossmans we knew has changed for the better! we played decently on the kit. but once we were done, we were once again told we were too loud on the drums. struggling with the combo of keeping the BIG drum sound of springsteen alive while not being too loud for patrons. its tough lesson to learn & even a harder one to put into practice & use!

bloodskin

so a week ago we were jamming on the kit with rosalita at the geary st rehearsal factory. after a song we realized there was blood drops on half the hihat cymbals & the snare. first we made the quick check that it wasn’t ours then got mildly disgusted. who bleeds on a hourly rental kit & then doesn’t clean it up? who doesn’t clean the gear? then we thought, why haven’t we come across this more often? fret not, we moved the hihats/snare so we were hitting the non bloody parts & told the powers that be about the mess.

lo & behold we come back a week later to find the same blood drops (see pics) on the snare! the hihats had been cleaned or the blood wore off. but no attempt had been made on the snare. now we were truly disgusted. rehearsal factory loses big points for not cleaning their gear within a week!

the Chamber door closes

just an quick update. things are moving fast here at the Hills (as u likely guessed) due to the lack of posts.

we had a killer show with Rosalita and Mollys Chamber on March 2nd at Duffys. Playing the drum kit for the Rosas has been wikked fun & we are enjoying the vibe immensely. Mollys Chamber’s new singer was on display for the first time with the band & hit a homer out of the park. great times all around!

here’s a megamix of some slightly distorted viz from the nite:

Mollys Chamber Megamix

Sadly though this was 2 be our last official show with the Chamber as we had to give our notice just this past week. it was a great 7 month ride with the band & we learned a helluva lot of new songs & we also learnt a lot about bass along the way. can’t wait to see the band at their next gig as we are 100% sure they will have no probs finding an eager replacement! if u know some1 interested apply at their website. more posts soon!

tumbling along

so we divorced facebook at the new year to free up some time.  & what do we do? we tweet more & put up a tumblr site.  so far so good we thinks.

follow us on tumbr here: http://thehillsalive.tumblr.com/

tweets here:  http://twitter.com/thehillsalive

tumblr has only been active for a few days but its turning out to be our multimedia feed of twitter.  or like twitter on roids.  we’ll see how that goes.  its fun for the time being.

as for fb, we log on once a week.  but since we trimmed our friends down its easy peasy to see what is important and comment/catch up.  should have done that wayyy sooner but glad we finally did.

ps: here’s the latest pic of the drum kick head taped up.  we smashed thru the last tape job but we scored a new head now (for free, thx tasty keith!) so once we bust thru this mess of tape, its onto a new one with a hardcore kick spot even!

 

skipapalooza 2!

its gonna be BIG!

so excited & honoured once to be able to do skipapalooza a 2nd time!

more deats to follow!

Gettin’ Jiggy with It

as Janaury comes to a close its been a whirlwind both off & on the music front.
first a BIG HELLO to this fine puppy:

this blog needs more sub woofer!

its been a life altering week already just with her in the mix. she’s great & well worth a few puppy hiccups.

add that Mollys Chamber finally narrowed down the decision on a new singer last week & things are sounding fantastic on that front! one official jam into the version 2.0 & its a bonafide upgrade that will delight every1′s ears & eyes.  first show is in under 5 wks at Duffy’s Tavern in Toronto on Friday, March 2nd.

that show will be a hootenanny!  not only will the Chamber be headlining with 2 face melting sets & debuting the new singer with a few new songs BUT yours truly will also be spinning rockin’ tunes throughout the evening AND drumming for the opener.  Whoa.  Whaaat? Waitaminute?  did you just say drumming?

for the time being, we’ve joined the ranks of Rosalita, a Bruce Springsteen cover act.  its got a female twist with all vocal duty being done all by the fairer sex.  its something that came our way unexpected but a few jams in & its sounding awesome already.  can’t wait to play for this show on all fronts but we are beyond cloud 9 because we finally get to do a show behind the kit again after a year &  a half (excluding a few open mics)! we’ve already broke a stick & busted thru our taped up kick drum head (again!) in prep for this BOSS debut. at least we got a few extra months out of it. looks like we need to do some percussion shopping!

busted again!

great times spinning tunes this past weekend.  so much work these past few wks catching up on what has been getting ppl moving lately but well worth seeing everybody groovin!

lastly, we have no idea why we called this post what it is. it just popped into our head!

Holiday Party in Unionville!

just put the wraps to a holiday party at Jakes in Unionville with Those Handsome Hooligans.  despite not jaming in 3 weeks, the band gave a good performance to the small but vocal crowd.  we had a few blips and one tune we could not remember for the life of us but ah well, good thing it was the last song! rumours are we will have another show next weekend.  a super special party if everything pans out. after some epic moments tonight, we can’t wait to play again!

been considering playing more drums again lately.  actually been thinking of jamming with more ppl with ourselves behind the kit instead of the bass. a couple of interesting options came our way this past week but after a good time tonight and a great time with the bass, its hard to put it down for any length of time.  so we drew the conclusion that our drumming days are mostly at an end.  we just wanna play bass!

post soon about our recent vacay!  stay tuned!

bassmorgasborg II

before we get to the bass, as we’ve stated previously we are keeping up with are drumming on a every other day basis.  we think its a good to keep tabs on the ol’ kit and tricks just in case and to help keep that sense of what its like going.  anyways, the other day we responded to an online request for a drummer to come out to a casual jam and play along to some songs by the Clash.  well, being that the Clash are our fave band of all time, this was a no brainer for us and we wholeheartly took up the challenge.  we blasted thru 15 or so songs in 2.5 hrs and at least 60% of those would have been stage ready IMHO.  it was crazy good and met all our expectations!  plans are to have another go at some songs in sept.  can’t wait!

peggy's buddy!

we scored a bass cab the other day.  15″ that can handle 300w easily.  its pretty darn big and weighs about 60 lbs but the price was right and its not like we’ll be using it at every gig.  the plans are to use it mainly for outdoor shows.  we took the grill off as it was rattling and then took the Fender logo off that since the look of logo wasn’t that retro.  the rattle was the grill hitting the edges of the speaker so we added some weather stripping to the points where the 2 were touching and put the grill back on.  it bows out a bit but sounds great now and thats what matters.  we plan on taking the direct out of peggy the amp and feeding that into a PA amp(thats all we have for a head right now… ah, the search for a bass head is ON!) and enhancing the low end signal that way.  we plan to debut it next weekend at one of our outdoor gigs.

peggy's buddy with the grill on!

finally an update on our pedal situation.  we were not using our EHX bass big muff as much as we woulda liked and our BBE sonic stomp was always in use but we never quite 100% happy with what it was doing to our sound.  so we’ve been casually searching for a replacement for both and we think we found it with a Catlinbread SFT.   it not only add some variable grit to our sound but also is quite nice at allowing us to tweak our tones.  we took it out to our gig last weekend.  we had only really spent about 30 mins with the pedal to make sure it worked and sounded ok.  it took about a set to get used to her sensitivity(it responds to how hard or soft u play!) and once we locked in a setting that was right for the sweet reggae vibe it was perfect the entire night!  any pedal that inspires you and makes u anxious to get back to playing again just so you can hear it HAS TO BE GOOD! its also likely that her sensitive side will make us a better bassist in the future.  here’s a pic of the august pboard set up.  looking at the pic makes us think that less is more. the sft is a good step fwd in usefullness and quality so we can’t wait to enjoy it more!

august pedalboard!